Abstract
Abū Manṣūr Jamāl al-Dīn al-Ḥasan b. Yūsuf b. Muṭahhar al-Ḥillī, known as al-‘Allāma al-Ḥillī (648/1250 – 726/1325), is one of the most prominent Twelver or Imāmi Shī‘i scholars of Medieval times. His Arabic nickname al-‘allāma means “the man of most knowledge” or “the most learned one,” embracing the “traditional [religious] sciences” (al-‘ulūm al-naqliyya) and the “intellectual sciences” (al-‘ulūm al-‘aqliyya). He also seems to have been the first Shī‘i scholar to receive post mortem, by the famous theologian Muḥammad Bāqir al-Majlisī (d. 1111/1699), the title of āyat allāh (“sign of God”), that would eventually be granted to the most authoritative jurists (fuqahā’) in modern and contemporary Twelver Shī‘i communities (al-Majlisī 1983, vol. 53, pp. 221, 252; vol. 106, p. 30). In the Shī‘i historiography, al-Ḥillī remains famous for his role in the conversion of the Ilkhānid ruler Uljaytū (r. 703–716/1304–1316) to Shī’ism, as well as in the spread of Shī‘i beliefs in Iran. He remains as the main representative of the rationalist school of al-Ḥilla, in Iraq, whose influence replaced that of the traditionalist school of Qum, in Iran, following the destruction of this city by the Mongols. With regards to the evolution of the Imāmi doctrine, he was one of the main artisans of the reformist current which, following the Occultation of the twelfth Imām in 329/940–941, turned the esoteric Shī‘i religion into a rationalized system of beliefs and practices, dominated by jurisprudence (fiqh) and progressively politicized (Kohlberg 1983). He is credited with more than 100 works in various fields that pertain to principles of law (uṣūl al-fiqh), theology (kalām), and other religious sciences, as well as philosophy and logic. His works, with those of his teacher Naṣīr al-Dīn Ṭūsī (d. 672/1273), represent the last school of original thought in Shī‘i Imāmi theology (kalām), the work of the later generations consisting mostly in commentaries upon them (Madelung 1970, p. 28). His compendium of theology entitled Bāb al-ḥādī‘ashar (“the Eleventh Chapter”), together with its commentary by Miqdād al-Suyūrī (d. 826/1423), still serve today among Shī‘i schools as an authoritative exposition of the principles of the Imāmi faith (al-Ṭihrānī 1983, vol. 3, pp. 5–7).
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Terrier, M. (2020). ‘Allama al-Ḥillī. In: Lagerlund, H. (eds) Encyclopedia of Medieval Philosophy. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-1151-5_584-1
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